Month: August 2006

I think I figured out what keeps C. from sleeping through the night. The last time S. worked an overnight shift, I was up with C. every two hours. Last night, S.’s first night shift in 10 days, C. and I enjoyed three lovely hours together, between 3:00 and 6:00 while she went through two bottles, two diapers, played, got cranky, and then refused so sleep on her own despite falling asleep immediately each time I picked her up and held her close. In contrast, last week when S. worked days, we had two nights with only one bottle, and all the other nights had only two quick feedings. Maybe I need to put S. on the phone with her just before bed-time to trick her into thinking both parents are home.

It was an all=around delightful day Tuesday. I finally got C. back to bed around 6:00, and M. was up an hour later. I hustled her downstairs, got her changed, some breakfast, and put her in front of the Disney Channel, thinking C. would surely sleep until 9:00 or so and I could get a nap in. Not two minutes after I laid down, C. is yelling for daddy. I struggled to make it until S. got home at 9:00. Turns out she had a great night of her own, as a baby her team was covering died. All day, we had maybe 15 minutes of peace from both kids. The rest of the day, one kid or the other was crying or whining about something. We went for the super early dinner around 5:00, with plans to go to a park afterwards. At the park, there were a few older two-year-olds running around. Kids closer to three than two, with a lot more confidence than M.. She was getting freaked out by them, because they all wanted to be her friend. One girl, Madison, even said, “M. is my new friend!” M. looked at her like she was insane. So we did 20 uncomfortable minutes of her walking around, trying to stay away from the other kids, and refusing to do anything I suggested.
“Want to go on the swings?”
“Nooooo.”
“Want to go down the slide?”
“Nooooo.”
Those are very whiney nooooos, by the way.
When we gave up, we were repaid with a tantrum that lasted the entire 15 minute ride home. Good times. Toddlers are so much fun when they’re overly tired. Is there a camp somewhere that we can send them away to until they’ve passed this stage? Then, she starts counting in Spanish, makes it to ten, and I think, “This kid is great!”

Wednesday, we’re trying the zoo. Wish us luck.

I know, I know, pretty shitty blog production on my part recently. In my defense, C. just can’t get this sleeping at night thing down, and pretty much every night we’re getting up every 2-3 hours with her. The frustrating part is she drinks two ounces of formula, passes out before she can finish it off, which just means she’ll be up again in a couple hours. I thought about experimenting with IV formula consumption Friday night when S. worked, and I was up at 11:45, 1:30, 3:00, 5:00, 5:45, and finally 6:30, but I thought better of it. When the evening rolls around, and I get a little freedom to put my thoughts on-line, I’ve been far too tired. She’s gotta start sleeping longer eventually, right?

Any of the other parents out there know what “Poppy doppy” means? M. started saying it over the weekend, and now anytime I say it to her, she laughs like crazy and then repeats it over and over. She got it somewhere, but we can’t figure out where. A translation would be helpful.

Homegirl can now count to ten in English and five in Spanish, and throws some wicked A-B-C action into her conversations. She’ll be talking to you about your shoes or the birds at the birdfeeder or the fact that C. is crying and suddenly bust into, “A,B,C,D,E,F….” She’ll get lost shortly after F, but then catch up at L,M,N,O,P and then finish strong with W,X,Y,Z. I’m telling you, we won’t even need to fill out an application for Notre Dame, they’ll come to us and beg us to send her there.

This little lull I’ve had in blogging has got me thinking about what I’m getting from Typepad and if I can justify the expense going forward. I picked it because it’s far more reliable than all of the free options out there, gave me some freedom to change the look without needing to learn any HTML or CSS, and had a good overall look to it. They’ve had a few hiccups lately, and I realize I’m not really getting full value for what I pay them each year. So I was all ready to cancel my account, get a refund, and move the blog someplace new and free. Then I read the fine print and saw they don’t offer refunds, so looks like I’m stuck here for awhile. The good news is the company behind Typepad is putting together a pretty snazzy looking free service that I’ve been playing around with the Beta version. That could be a decent replacement come next spring when my Typepad account is up for renewal. We shall see. I haven’t made you update your e-mail address for me in awhile, so I have to change something soon!

I’ve been thinking a lot about all this madness in the sports world relating to athletes using performance enhancers. I can’t get it coherent quite yet, but it will be appearing somewhere in this space soon, I promise. To prepare, I would ask my sports-minded readers to think about two words: Jason Giambi.

For now, that is all.